Sean Dyche hails Leeds’ role in reviving Dominic Calvert-Lewin after Everton injury struggles | OneFootball

Sean Dyche says a new environment and less pressure have enabled Dominic Calvert-Lewin to flourish at Leeds United after leaving Everton.

Calvert-Lewin departed Goodison as a free agent last summer after nine years, joining Leeds amid fitness doubts. He had started fewer than 20 Premier League games in three of his previous four seasons and had not reached double figures since 2020/21.

Since a league debut against Newcastle in August, he has not missed a top-flight game through injury, only sitting out the 2-2 draw at Chelsea due to illness. That availability brought an England recall last month.

“We tried, we did all sorts of things to protect him, and tried to release the pressure off him to allow his body time to recover,” Dyche told talkSPORT. “He was close, but we could never get him full-out freedom to go sprint and play; he has found that at Leeds.”

“At Everton, it was sort of, ‘when is he back?’ for a few years, and maybe that was a burden to carry.”

Despite only one league goal since early February, he hit seven in six through winter, earning December’s Premier League Player of the Month.

One was an 82nd-minute header in a 1-1 draw at Brentford from a Willy Gnonto cross. “I’m feeling good,” Calvert-Lewin told Sky Sports. “I think this is the fittest I’ve been in a long time and I've worked extremely hard to get in this position.”

“When you get a certain narrative around you and you’re tarred with a certain brush, it's quite hard to shake it.”

Source: yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk